First of all, this bad boy has two CDs. The first has Ben backed up by the Innocent Criminals, and is over 70 minutes long, so you can get the full concert experience without the body odor and the tattooed broad next to you blowing her boyf- I mean, her lunch in front of you about halfway through the set. I even recognized a couple of songs --- Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing" for one, which they actually do a decent interpretation of, and Led Zep's "Whole Lotta Love" where the band's reach exceeds their grasp. There's also the expected political correctness of "Excuse Me, Mr." Which makes me want to reach through the speakers and slap the lot of them, and "Mama's Got A Boyfriend, " which is hysterically funny without meaning to be. Then, of course, they include "Burn One Down;" if you're wondering what they're burning, it's not a Virgin Megastore, where you're not allowed to burn anything, even if it's legal, though oft-maligned, tobacco. "Ground On Down" gets a lot of cheers from the audience so it must be a hit, and deservedly so. Not bad. It rocks and I think it's about making love to your woman. Pretty good.

The second CD features Ben all by himself, just him and his guitar; the Innocent Criminals must have violated parole or something. I cannot properly evaluate the second CD because I was nonplussed by the similarity of Ben's voice, playing, and music to...Cat Stevens. Yep, if I didn't know better I'd think ol' Cat had patched things up with both of his remaining fans, got under the sunlamp for an extended period, and was touring the country under a new name. Same voice, same guitar styling, same insipid whining for peace and tolerance in the songs. To be fair, though, Cat Stevens never stretched a point like Harper does in "Like A King, " where he compares Martin Luther to Rodney. The people love it, though. I felt like I was in some sort of Philip K. Dick timeloop and it was the early '70s all over again. The solo acoustic clocks in at just over 60 minutes real time and about three days sidereal time, so you don't need to pack a lunch or anything, but you might want to have someone check you for bedsores while you're listening to it.

There is going to be a companion video to this project, full of shots of the stage and the crowd from different perspectives, and possibly with some different songs. I wonder if they'll do what U2 did for their concert project and get all of the ugly people out of the front rows. I'll have to check it out. In the meantime you've got LIVE FROM MARS to tide you over.